


apricate

by belletrist



Series: gifts [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angry Harry, Angry Harry Potter, Angst, Domestic Fluff, Gen, I apologize for using both & and / tags but I don't know where the story is going, I will update tags as the story progresses, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Parseltongue, Seer Harry Potter, Snake Voldemort, Snakes, Squib Harry Potter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:15:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23641456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belletrist/pseuds/belletrist
Summary: apricate: (v.) to bask in the sun.Or: Harry Potter runs away from home and takes refuge in an abandoned manor, inhabited solely by a strangely intelligent snake.
Relationships: Harry Potter & Tom Riddle, Harry Potter & Tom Riddle | Voldemort, Harry Potter & Voldemort, Harry Potter/Tom Riddle, Harry Potter/Tom Riddle | Voldemort, Harry Potter/Voldemort
Series: gifts [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1440301
Comments: 13
Kudos: 289





	apricate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [asterismal (asterisms)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/asterisms/gifts).



> **Prompt:**
> 
> Harry Potter is a gardener for Lord Riddle's estate. One day, he meets an unusually talkative snake hiding beneath the flowers. Unbeknownst to Harry, the snake is Tom Riddle under a curse.

On Harry's 17th birthday, he ran away.

Harry had had enough. Enough to where he could not bear to wait another year until he turned eighteen and legally became an adult. Harry was tired- he was so tired. Tired of the way his relatives treated him. Tired of their unfair treatment of him. Tired of being referred to as a "freak", despite the fact that, to his knowledge, he had never _done_ anything remotely freakish. Tired of being blamed for things that were not his fault. Tired of being yelled at and pushed around and humiliated. 

Tired of being reminded that he would never have a place in their home.

Well, screw them. Harry would find a home of his own. And if he couldn't find one, he would make one, with his two bare hands if need be. 

So Harry packed up what few belongings he had, and left.

* * *

Harry lost track of how far he traveled. 

He walked until he found a bus stop, and boarded a bus. Harry had stamina, from the chores and the running from Dudley and such, but he underestimated how exhausting walking long distances was. And how time consuming. 

He couldn't risk getting caught.

So he boarded the bus, grateful for the money he grabbed on his way out to cover the fare, and rode it until it arrived at an exchange station. He located the bus that seemed to be traveling the farthest, and boarded it. Rode that bus until he arrived at a station. Located the bus that seemed to be traveling the farthest. Boarded it. Rinse and repeat.

He suspected he should have grabbed a map. Made some sort of plan of where he was going. But since when had Harry ever been a planner?

Besides. Harry had... well, nothing ever strange happened around him, not like the Dursleys claimed, but Harry Knew things sometimes. Knew when a car was about to turn the corner too fast and too quickly, running a stop sign; he got out of the way just before it hit him. Knew where the balls were coming from in dodgeball class, every time, so he could avoid them if he wanted. Knew what snakes whispered to each other when they slithered through the grass. Knew things he couldn't explain knowing.

And it was this that guided Harry now. Harry didn't know where he was going, but Harry Knew where he was going.

Or, he would once he got there.

Which might be a while.

Harry lost track of buses and stops, of walking and hiking between, of the countryside flying by out the window. It all looked the same, after a while—cityscapes giving way to rolling moors and sparse trees, giving way to towns and villages again, giving way to more farms and pastureland.

It took lengthening shadows and the growing discontent in his stomach for Harry to realize it was getting late.

He got off at the next stop, and put his hand up to about where the horizon lay to try to estimate how much time he had left before the sun set. Less than an hour. _Damn._

Sighing, he turned, walking resolutely away from the center of town, out into the outskirts and moorland. He could likely find a place in a grove or such to camp overnight. Far better to risk encounters with local wildlife than to risk someone finding him on a nearby bench or in a shed and taking him to the police; he would likely end up in jail—or worse, back at the Dursleys'. 

Lost in thought, he rounded a curve in the road, and stopped in startled realization. 

There was a mansion on the top of the hill. 

It had been hidden from view by the trees expertly planted around it—and by Harry’s drooping head, not that he would ever admit it—until just now. A sprawling place, grand yet decrepit, obviously uninhabited in the way so many old places were; as if the life had just faded from the building like a dying breath.

And Harry Knew, in the way Harry just Knew things sometimes, that this had been his destination all along—that _this was where he was supposed to be._

As the sun finished in its slow descent, vanishing below the horizon, Harry pushed open the front door of the manor, and stepped inside.

**Author's Note:**

> i took some liberties with the prompt, because it be like that sometimes.


End file.
